The Pogroms of Happiness

Only when you have money will I be you. 
Only if you are successful will I hang around with you,
then and then only if you are me will I talk to you. 

I have heard this all my life and totally understand the statements, afterall the statements are the trappings of a modern materialistic life.  Its easy to understand what people want from you if you are the rich and famous, if you aren't well there's only blissful ignorance.  Imagine being shut off from every single person you have known your life because they have pained you.  Every single face brings memories of hurt that turn quickly into hatred.  I hate that face, so why do I have to talk to him.  That woman has only malice towards me and I have to say please and thank you.  No please and no thank you, I would rather go down and down and down till you can't see me and till you forget me, till you don't even find my mention in the obituaries, till I am banished even from your thoughts, like the car washer or the menial job worker who cleans your clothes and washes your dishes.  Till that moment arrives I can't really rise because your jealousy causes pain and pulls me down.  I have no money so why are you jealous of me, you must hate my face so much that every moment of my happiness causes a strong sense of anger in you.  You must really hate me a lot, I can sense it and feel it, go away screams your mind at me, and I will go away for I don't want this either.  NOT ANY OF THIS.

This brings memories of the tea stalls and small time biscuit shops, of "mathis", the eternal favourite indian snack.  There is some kind of magic in sitting on a crooked broken wooden 2 seater stool and just sipping tea and trying to forget hurtful memories till somebody arrives at the shack and the face or voice resembles somebody so much that I run to the next destination, not wanting to fight, maybe too confused and scared to fight, I just run to the next destination not knowing where it is.  Just godammit, let the night come, for the day brings too many memories.  I don't know how to spend my time and it is too expensive riding a car nowadays to visit far of destinations and who wants to visit ugly relatives anyhows.  So I walk and I walk like at least 5-10 kms every day, same area, different routes visiting different strangers selling their wares.  I have lost the sense of time, nothing exists as I just wait for the day to set and night to come and then there is one final meal and then sleep.  I have an Air Conditioner to sleep under but I don't pay the bills for it.  So I run, because life I think life doesn't want me to earn money.  I think I am looking for a motive, an answer to my predicament and some kind of rationalization, why am I so vague and unbonded, why do I hate my friends and family so much ?  I know the answers and I have them in me, its just that my mind is unwilling to accept them. 

I just don't have the skills - to earn money.  I have spent thirty years of my life, since I was born, doing something that doesn't earn me money.  And since I don't have money, nobody loves me.  I run away from this thought, seek solace in loneliness, when there is no solace to be found.  I am lonely and desireless.  Everything and everyone I desire is not with me anymore.
Set people free, so that you are not taken for granted.

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ALL IS WELL

Remember Three Idiots the movie, and what people thought of it as movie.  Everyone thought it was remarkable and I thought well, its remarkable alright because the whole movie is about "miracles do happen".  If you are an Indian then miracles happen almost everyday.  Remember that visit to the hospital when so many people came to visit the doctor, and you were like wondering where did all these people come from.  Well my dear friend, they came because they wanted to know if you were all OK.  Imagine a person in a hospital read overglorified five stars if nobody is around when you are ill.  People team around you like worker bees around a queen bee because they want to know if "All is Well".  I always remember the old hindi song " Jo bhi pyar sey milla, hum ussey key ho liye".  After all life is too short to search for old friends.  So whoever you meet with love is a friend, my dear friend.  I have turned a cynic towards the late half of my life.  Turned 40 two years back, and started to wonder if anyone even takes critical, cynical people too seriously.  A dreamer they love, somebody who gives them positivity and dreams to take back home.  The dream merchants are all there, where they churn out dreams after dreams, all so real, or should I say "reel".

I confess I am not much of a dreamer nowadays, I only dream while I am awake.  Logic would dictate that, that means I am sleeping soundly most of the times.  Another song that comes to my mind "Days are Passing quickly now, Nights are seldom long", does the signify another milestone in my life.  It turned when I got married at 22, then it turned again at 32 when I was certified a misfit and again at 42 it takes a turn, don't know for what, except the only thing I realise is "that my best days are yet to come".  Do you realise how intrinsic songs are in our life.  Absolute mood busters, you wanna feel good take the ones that play on local FM channels everyday and on the other hand if you want to bust your good mood look up some old classics on youtube.  Beatles played an enormous part in bringing up my generation, you can well imagine all boys and girls in large sized goggles and sporting wide hemmed bell bottoms and tight fitting T-shirts jiving to "She loves me Yea Yea Yea".  Can you believe it, I formed a part of this group too.  I laugh my head of when I realise that I could have been carried away by such things as attitude and thoughts of who wore what and talked what before I made friends.  Imagine, if you didn't have a cool set of sneakers I wouldn't be seen with you.  What a joke matey !! .. ain't it ?  I believe that we are ignorant when we are young and even more ignorant as we grow older .. best left unsaid what I feel about myself today except that if there is a way to change then that is the way we must choose.

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